By: ERKIN ESENGELDIEV
Staff Writer
Hello, my name is Erkin, and I’m an exchange student from Kyrgyzstan, Central Asia. I have been a student at El Diamante since August 22, 2022, while adapting to the lifestyle of an American teenager. It ain’t easy – I faced all kinds of difficulties being here, like homesickness, culture shock, and nuances of western communications. 6 months of my staying here taught me a lot, and I’m ready to share my experience with you!
This is the first part of my Exchange Year articles, where I talk about my experience as a foreign exchange student and prior to that. This article is solely devoted to my participation in the 3-stage FLEX competition and the things that had been done before I came to the U.S. Enjoy!
So, where exactly am I from?
I come from Kyrgyzstan, a post-soviet country in Central Asia, that has lots of mountains and rivers, over 8 million people, and only 4 KFC restaurants. In Kyrgyzstan, you can see people of various nationalities and ethnicities, such as Kyrgyz, Russian, Uzbek, Korean and more, with prevalent languages being Kyrgyz and Russian. Learn more about my country by visiting the El Diamante Culture Fair (February 3rd, Lunchtime)!
In Kyrgyzstan, it is becoming more and more popular to study abroad and it’s encouraged by parents to go out and explore various possibilities for themselves in search of better education. Many people apply for colleges in the U.S., Germany, Czech Republic, etc., and participate in exchange programs, the most notable one being the FLEX (Future Leader Exchange) program.
“FLEX is a highly competitive, merit-based scholarship program funded by the U.S. Department of State that operates in Armenia, Azerbaijan, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, etc. Over 35,000 students compete annually in multiple rounds of testing to earn a FLEX scholarship, which provides for them to spend an academic year in the United States living with a volunteer host family and attending a U.S. high school”. (Read more about FLEX on their website).
In order to participate in the program you have to win a 3-stage competition that usually starts in early September and requires basic-level knowledge of the English language, motivation, and skills in essay writing. Those three stages are:
- Writing 3 essays in response to the given questions, for example: “List 5 characteristics and traits that will help during your exchange year”, “Describe a time in your life when you had to voice your opinion? What did you do when some weren’t agreeing with you?”. Each of the texts had to be 600 words long and have some kind of life example to it. The program doesn’t require you to be grammatically correct, instead, you have to focus on your experience and critical thinking. For me, it was the easiest part of the contest, because we weren’t pressured by time (we had 1 month to submit them) and the percentage of people passing this stage was generally high.
- Because of COVID-19, the program had its recruitment online, so the second stage, which was the stage where we had to prove our English skills, was sent to us by a link to the test just 24 hours after we submitted the essays. The test lasted 60 minutes and was pretty challenging, but super useful, as in the end, it showed you your scores in each section (reading and comprehending, listening and translating).
- The last but most important round was going after nearly 2 months since the other two since there were more than 5 thousand participants to review. With some delays, they announced the semi-finalists in mid-December. The third stage consisted of writing 3 essays in 45 minutes under online supervision, an interview with an English speaker, and tons of paperwork (the hardest part of it all for me). The essay part was difficult, because you had to think of an answer fast and type it down as soon as you thought of it, and sometimes it was difficult to come up with a real-life story. The questions were similar to the ones from the first round, only you didn’t have time to revise and change anything. The interview was all about confidence and logical thinking, so I had to be calm, even though it was kind of tense to answer in a foreign language. Many call it the hardest part, and I agree with that since the questions were much more nuanced and deep.
It wasn’t until April that the finalists were announced. I was very happy, my family and friends were cheering, as this was my goal from when I first heard about FLEX. I felt proud and accomplished, not realizing it was just the start of my year-long journey.
A total of 64 Kyrgyz contestants out of nearly 5k passed the competition and were preparing for the departure. But it was no fast process: we had to go through vaccinations, enormous amounts of paperwork, and passport-making procedures in order to finally be ready, not counting for placement organizations to get ahold of us and getting info from our host families (It was actually pretty stressful, they found my host family just two weeks before my flight!). Before the departure, we had a 2-day PDO (Pre-Departure Orientation) which was held in the mountains and run by FLEX alumni. During the orientation, they taught us basic rules of American etiquette, stipend money management, basic social skill advice, and much more. A big part of the exchange year is culture sharing – so we had to prepare a presentation about different cultural aspects of our country on PDO! My team and I made one about Kyrgyz traditional food and won an award for the best presentation! It was really fun, meeting new people from different parts of Kyrgyzstan and gathering to make something entertaining and informative, that we can use here in America.
Then was my departure date, the 16th of August. Exhausting 21 hours of flight from Istanbul, Turkey, to Washington D.C, Virginia, then to Denver, Colorado, to eventually arrive at Fresno and get picked up by my host dad. And here I am!
Although I realized that competition isn’t the real challenge here, I’m still proud I was able to pass and take this amazing opportunity to travel here. I can’t stress enough how important it is for me to be here, how emotional I get looking back and saying “Oh my God. I’m in America”. I’m very lucky and I will never take it for granted.